I can’t stop talking about food. I love that it takes everything I love and makes it practical, and you don’t have to justify it like you do writing or making pictures. Because everyone has to eat. I love how it’s slow. That it’s social and communal, celebratory, and cultural and political and ritualized, all of those things, are wonderful. But I really love cooking for myself. That I can bake a cake just for myself. That most of what I make is mine.
“…the very categories of language are created by intentional hand actions, so that verbs derive from hand movements, nouns ‘hold’ things as names, and adverbs and adjectives, like hand tools, modify movement and objects.”
The Craftsman-Richard Sennett
Progress is being made on at least one front.
I winged my way into these gigantic raspberry scones this morning.
Also remade this, accidentally lost in the Great Data Erasure of 2009. It’s always better the second time around anyway.
I’m reading The Craftsman, by Richard Sennet- I’ve only just started, but it’s great so far. He says many smart things about the social functions of workshops and authority, and how originality somehow gave artists less autonomy and more vulnerability. There’s also this:
Workshops present and past have glued people together through work rituals, whether these be a shared cup of tea or the urban parade; through mentoring, whether the formal surrogate parenting of medieval times or informal advising on the worksite; through face-to-face sharing of information.
I’m having one of those reading experiences that reaffirms what I already believe, in other words. I’m lucky to run a workshop in NYC; I love being able to bring a wide variety of people together to work in a social hub. Shared workspaces are the ideal solution for the making of impractical objects in a city where real estate gets in the way of starting things.
I’m eating hot chili cabbage and running the fan in the kitchen to cool it off after baking a raspberry buttermilk cake.
Summer’s my favorite time of year.
My hard drive died last weekend, and now it’s like my computer has dementia. It reminds me of how nice it is when things fall apart in a really dramatic sort of way, because that means you have room for something new.
I made this most amazing strawberry tart tonight, in honor of my friend Miriam, who’s is coming over for dinner tomorrow. It made me glad that it’s May, with many baked goods full of fresh fruit in front of me, and not November, with plenty of turnips to look forward to. Nothing against turnips, but you know. Look at that tart. Beats root vegetables any day. Lives up to the word tart.
I made a poster I liked, really liked, this weekend as well. This is a proof in progress, but you get the idea. I haven’t made something I’ve really liked that wasn’t food in awhile.
Word of the day:
Can’t stand them.
